AI Cannot Fake This Kind of Learning — This Week with EdSurge

Every few months, another headline declares the college degree dead. This Week with EdSurge puts that claim to the test with two guests defending something slow against something fast. Rita Finkel of the Armory Foundation argues that a four-year degree still holds value at a moment when artificial intelligence can produce a credential adjacent skill in minutes. Then Cobretti Williams of the EdSurge Voices of Change Fellowship makes a similar case for writing, where an essay can take months to draft even though AI could produce one in eight seconds. Both guests land on the same idea: skip the time, and you skip the point.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

Bachelor's degree holders earned a median of $81,800 in 2024, compared to $50,600 for high school graduates, a gap of 62%, according to the College Board's Education Pays 2026 report .
From 2000 to 2025, workers with only a high school diploma consistently faced unemployment rates at least 2.3 percentage points higher than college graduates, according to a St. Louis Fed analysis .
A McKinsey survey of more than 3,000 employers found that skills such as critical thinking and judgment remain in high demand from employers even as AI adoption grows.
Cobretti Williams describes how the EdSurge Voices of Change Fellowship helps teachers develop their writing across multiple drafts, arguing that the growth between a fellow’s first and fourth essay only comes from doing the work yourself.

STORIES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE

Why College Degrees Matter in the Age of AI by Rita Finkel

EdSurge Voices of Change Writing Fellowship by EdSurge, featuring Cobretti Williams

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HOST AND CONTRIBUTORS

Host: Ira Apfel

Featuring:

Rita Finkel , Co-President, Armory Foundation
Cobretti Williams , Editor, EdSurge Voices of Change Fellowship